Trump, 79, Faces Congressional Bid to Invoke 25th Amendment
50 House Democrats are backing the bill amid concerns about Trump’s “erratic” behavior.
Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty/Reuters
A group of House Democrats has introduced a long-shot plan to remove President Donald Trump from office by invoking the 25th Amendment.
The bill was released by House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin on Tuesday after he sounded the alarms on Trump’s behavior last week and called for the president to take a cognitive test and publicly release the results.
The legislation establishes a Commission on Presidential Capacity to Discharge the Powers and Duties of Office, which is the body and process outlined in Section 4 of the 25th Amendment.
Raskin compared it to the legislative counterpart to the Cabinet, invoking the 25th Amendment to remove the president from office in the event of a medical crisis.
House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin introduced legislation to establish a commission under the 25th Amendment to determine if the president has the capacity to fulfill the duties of the office.
Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images
“Public trust in Donald Trump’s ability to meet the duties of his office has dropped to unprecedented lows as he threatens to destroy entire civilizations, unleashes chaos in the Middle East while violating Congressional war powers, aggressively insults the Pope of the Catholic Church and sends out artistic renderings online likening himself to Jesus Christ,” Raskin said in a statement.
He warned the U.S. is at a “dangerous precipice, and it is now a matter of national security for Congress to fulfill its responsibilities under the 25th Amendment to protect the American people from an increasingly volatile and unstable situation.”
Despite the 25th Amendment being enacted in 1967, Congress never established that body to act alongside the vice president and the Cabinet.
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Under the legislation, the commission would create that group, which would determine whether the president is unable to fulfill the duties of the office.
It would consist of 17 members chosen by congressional leadership. Each leader would get to select a physician and a psychiatrist. The remaining seats would be held by former statespersons, such as Cabinet secretaries, with four chosen by each political party.
If the commission and vice president find that the president is incapacitated, the vice president would immediately assume the role of acting president.
The legislation is unlikely to move forward in the Republican-controlled House, but it could gain momentum should Democrats retake the majority in November.
Even if it did pass, the president would be unlikely to sign it. The Daily Beast asked the White House for comment on the effort.
But it is also the latest effort by Democrats to bring attention to the 79-year-old president’s behavior in recent weeks.
Questions have been raised about Trump’s health and mental acuity since he returned to the White House. Trump is the oldest person ever elected to office.
Last week, Raskin wrote a letter to Trump’s White House physician Dr. Sean Barbabella, calling for the president to take a cognitive test and for him to make himself available to answer questions under oath from committee members about the president’s health.
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